Tenetur Per Sanguine
by Jadiona
Summary: As a serial killer rampages Seattle, Victoria and her partner work to determine who it is and why they're killing the people that they do. But as the killer gets more and more emboldened, Victoria must make a decision. Both Public and Judges Vote 2nd Place Winner, Judge aushapasha's pick, Riddler Award (best mystery), and Best Use of a Batman Quote.


**Originally Entered In: **Crime Crusaders Contest

**Beta:** Monica03

**Summary:** As a serial killer rampages Seattle, Victoria and her partner work to determine who it is and why they're killing the people that they do. But as the killer gets more and more emboldened, Victoria must make a decision.

**Warning:** Story switches between first and third.

**Disclaimer: **All things Twilight belong solely to Stephenie Meyer. No copyright infringement is intended.

**Tenetur Per Sanguine**

In spite of what a lot of people believe, scoping a person in with a rifle is easy. And as long I can manage to convince myself that what I am shooting isn't a living, breathing human, then pulling that trigger is even easier.

I should know, I've done it enough times.

Carefully, I look through the rifle, scoping in the target of the evening. A little over five hundred feet away, stepping onto the roof of the building is my target. The man – a Paul Lahote originally from one of the reservations on the western edge of the state – is yet another cheater.

And today, I have become his judge. His jury... And his executioner.

The instant he lusted for someone other than his girl was the instant he stopped being human in my mind.

So I aim for his forehead, right between the eyes, and once he stops moving long enough for me to be sure I'm steady, I pull the trigger.

…

She steps onto the roof of the apartment with her partner of almost twelve years, walking beside him over to the body.

It's the tenth one since it started, a little more than two months ago. The killer has a modus operandi, as they always murder their victims with a sniper rifle. And the victims are always men. Though past that there seems to be no rhyme or reason behind the choices. The men have ranged in age from an eighty-year-old man to a fourteen-year-old boy, and have varied just as greatly in race.

"What was his name, and how old was he?" Victoria asks Mark, one of the cops already on the scene.

He looks up. "His name is Paul Lahote, he was twenty-seven. His family lives in La Push, though he shared an apartment in this building with his girlfriend, Kim Fallen."

Victoria knows where La Push is though she's never been there. Her partner, on the other hand, had lived near there back when he'd just been getting started.

"Do you know him?" she asks Charlie, looking at him.

"Not him, specifically, though I suppose it's possible I met him when he was a kid. He'd have been barely five years old when I left Forks."

Victoria crouches down next to the medical examiner, Riley, holding her hands out for a set of gloves from him. She carries her own on her, but she sees no pointing in wasting a pair of her own when he always has a seemingly endless supply. Riley grunts, handing her a pair.

She supposes the site of a dead body should disturb her, but as she'd already pointed out, it was the tenth kill from just this serial killer. Besides, even before she'd joined the force almost fifteen years ago, she'd served in the army for a solid six years – having gotten her dad to sign off and let her join when she'd been a mere seventeen.

"What can you tell us about him, Riley?" she asks.

"Based on body temp he's been dead for about eight hours. Also, if it's possible, the shooter managed to find the dead center of dead center." He points at the hole in the center of the man's forehead. "Honestly, I've never seen a more perfect shot."

Victoria barely resists the urge to roll her eyes at Riley's compliment towards the unknown serial killer.

"Where do you think the shot came from?" she asks, glancing up at her partner.

"Nothing super close is this high up. Closest place they could have shot from is that high rise, over there." Charlie nods his head toward a high rise about two blocks away.

"What is that? Like a thousand feet away?" Victoria asks.

"I'd say more like seven hundred feet, actually. Average city block is a little more than three hundred feet."

She knows that it's already been determined that the serial killer is a sniper, but she has to admit, his range is impressive, even to her.

"I guess we should go check out that high rise then." She doesn't feel like staying on the roof with the body longer than she has to. Even though it's a moderately cool day in Seattle, she knows it's only a matter of time before the body starts to smell.

Charlie looks around the crime scene for a minute before finally nodding. "Forensics will get everything here. We might as well head there."

They head back inside together and walk to the elevator to get back to the ground floor.

"God, I wish the FBI would get involved already. For god's sake, they're supposed to get involved after three," she grumbles on the way down.

"I guess because we get so many serial killers, they think we're used to it," Charlie says.

She barely stops her scowl, though she knows her partner has a point. Truly, it seems half the serial killers in the world have graced Seattle with their presence at one time or another.

Victoria changes the subject as they reach the ground floor and make their way back to the car so they can go to the likely place the shot was made from. "How's your daughter doing?"

"She's still with Edward," he grumbles.

"The vampire?"

"You think you're joking," Charlie mutters darkly.

She laughs, though it isn't funny. She's met Charlie's son-in-law only once, and Edward apparently suffers from albinism, or some other disease that causes loss of pigmentation, as he's super pale with red eyes – even his hair's washed-out.

Victoria supposes, to someone on the outside, it would look callous, that Charlie and she are talking about things unrelated to the case, laughing and carrying on. But after being on the force for as long as she has, it's something she takes for granted. You have to enjoy life when there's a chance to do so.

She doesn't ask about his ex though; she knows talking about Renee is a sore subject with her partner. The woman was having an affair with a biker going by the nickname of Two-Face and later ran off with him.

"And you, seeing anyone yet?" she asks, more to continue the light-hearted conversation than anything else.

"You know me, Vic, I'm married to my job."

The truth is, they both are. Her last relationship, with a bounty-hunter named James Napier, ended in disaster over five years ago. She still has a hard time believing that he ran off with the hoe down the street – as in a literal prostitute who went by Poison Ivy.

She hasn't bothered to start up another relationship since. Honestly, it's not like she has time for anyone. Being a police detective is a thirty-hour a day type of job.

"How's your sister doing?" Charlie asks gently as they get in the car.

Victoria shrugs slightly. "Good days and bad days. I suspect she'll fade sooner rather than later." She looks away, biting her lip. It's hard for her to think of the days that will come when Anne passes, but cancer is a cruel mistress, and usually, the only mercy ever found is in death.

"I'm sorry." Charlie's words are more of a mumble than anything else.

She shrugs again.

The truth is, there's nothing to be said. Whatever will happen, _will happen_.

When they reach the high rise, they're hit with a roadblock as the building owners don't want to give them access to the upper floors or the roof.

So Charlie and she spend the rest of the day filing motions to get a warrant to search the upper floors of the building, which quickly turns into multiple warrants when it turns out each floor is office space rented by different companies.

And by the end of the day, they're no closer to figuring out who's behind it all then they were to begin with.

…

I watch the house through the scope of my rifle, my finger tightening around the trigger before I force myself to relax.

I've never been sloppy before, not even when I was in training to become a sniper, and that was damn close to two decades ago. I hadn't even lost my sense of who I was – who I am – when someone stripped me to flesh and took my dignity.

The fact that I lost my best friend in the world only yesterday morning... The fact that fate took that person from me... Well, it's no reason to lose my head.

I've been through worse.

I focus back on the porch as a man steps onto his back porch. His wife is in the house, but she has no idea what the cheating asshole was doing only a few hours earlier in the back room of a club downtown.

I almost feel sorry for the mess she's going to find.

Not sorry enough to stop myself, though.

I take a deep breath, putting his forehead in my sight and pull the trigger.

The recoil, even though I have it on a stand, is worse than the noise of the shot – which, thanks to the suppressor, is nothing more than a soft snick.

I get up from my position, taking care to clean up any evidence of ever being there, before turning and leaving.

…

"Are you sure you're okay to work?" Charlie asks her as soon as he sees her entering the backyard.

Victoria grimaces slightly. "This is _our _case, Charlie. I'm not giving it up to someone else."

"Funny. Two weeks ago you were grumbling about how you were wishing the FBI would get involved already."

"Well, that was three victims ago. The last one was only three nights prior. And another one already? It's personal now." She looks at the body of the man on the back porch, muttering under her breath, "Besides, I didn't need the distraction before."

"You know, I've been thinking about that," Charlie said, "About the killer being a guy. What if we're wrong, what if it's a woman?"

Victoria looks at her partner in shock. "What would even make you think that? Statistically, women serial killers are rare. And with the exception of Wuornos, female serial killers who use a gun are unheard of. They're usually more intimate, using things like poison or garrote wire."

"I know, and yet, there's some pattern with these kills. Aside from them being men. And I'm almost sure once we figure out the pattern, everything will become clear. Including _exactly_ who the killer is."

"Hmm." Victoria isn't sure she agrees with his assessment.

After a moment she walks over to Riley with the newest victim. "So what can you tell me?"

"His name is Laurent Walks, and he's been dead for about six hours. His wife found him out here. She's the one that called it in."

"Has she been questioned? Do you know?" She asks.

"No. She was extremely upset by finding him here and had to be rushed to the hospital while they try to keep her from losing the baby."

"She's pregnant?" There's a certain amount of concern in her voice that she can't quite conceal.

"Yes. About four months." Riley looks down at the body. "Of course, what's weird is the sniper seemed to be off his game."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, the shot seems shaky. It's definitely a little to the right when comparing to the normal perfect center that our killer does. And I can't be certain until I get him to the morgue, but I'm pretty sure it's a little down, too."

Victoria frowns, but out of the corner of her eye, she notices her partner watching her, and she straightens her face into its normal cool.

"Could we be dealing with a copycat?" she asks Riley.

"It's possible, I guess, but the hole appears to be the same size as the previous ones, so I'm doubting it." Riley goes back to work on the body for a minute but then speaks again, "I just don't get it. Whoever it is, copycat or original, they're a sniper. Almost guaranteed they served, why would they do this to their own people."

"Back when I was in the military one of my commanding officers told me that 'you either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain.' My guess is that this sniper lived that long."

"Hmm."

Charlie walks up to her. "We're pretty sure it was a ground shot this time."

"Any idea where the shot came from, aside from the obvious?" She sweeps her arm in an east to west wave as she turns to face away from the body.

"Not yet. We should do some canvassing though."

She nods in agreement.

As they walk out of the backyard to see if they can find where the shot came from, Charlie reaches out and touches her shoulder. "Seriously, are you certain you shouldn't take more time off?"

"I'm fine. It's not like I didn't know it was coming."

"That doesn't necessarily make it any easier," he states.

It doesn't, but she shrugs his hand off. "Heard from your daughter lately?" she asks, going on the offensive to get him to stop asking questions about her.

"She called a couple of days ago. They're going to Moldova or someplace to visit some of his extended family." Charlie stops, not saying anything for several minutes, before finally continuing with a grumble. "I really don't like her husband."

She laughs. "What, unhappy that he's taking her to see the world?"

"Humph."

She rolls her eyes. "Okay you take this block, I'll take the next."

"We really should stick toge –"

"We'll get more done if we split up." Besides, she doesn't want to deal with his concern.

He frowns but eventually nods, and they split up.

As Victoria looks over her block, she tries to not think about her sister who passed only two days before, focusing her efforts on making sure she doesn't accidentally miss any hidden evidence.

At the end of the day, though, Charlie and she are still no closer to determining who the killer is.

…

I set up the rifle – a larger and more powerful caliber than my preference. I don't want to be doing this as he's not my typical target. In fact, he's almost the exact opposite.

But I don't see what choice I have.

He's getting too close to the truth for me to allow him to live.

Once I have the gun set up on the stand, I look through the scope to my target.

He sits on his couch, which faces away from his window. I once told him that it was a stupid idea to leave a couch in front of the window like that, and then he'd pointed out the bulletproof glass.

Of course, that's why I'm here with the big gun.

He has his TV set to a news channel, and when I look through my scope, I can see they're actually talking about me and my unknown reasons for the victims I choose.

I snort. The fact that no one has put it together that all the victims are adulterers still amazes me.

Well, at least they're my only victims until I put a bullet through his head.

Though given that my bullet is probably going to go through his entire house, this shot won't be associated with me as the serial killer.

I have to be grateful for that.

I focus back on scoping him in, taking in my friend of twelve years' head.

I really don't want to do this.

But he's my partner, he's the only one who will ever be capable of figuring out that I'm the real murderer.

And he's already guessed that a female is behind the kills.

I actually think he suspects me.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, he has to realize my sister and best friend in the whole world was diagnosed with stage four pancreas cancer on the same day as the first killing.

I'm sure he recognizes the signs even if he refuses to admit it.

I carefully start to squeeze down on the trigger as I take a deep breath, preparing to take out Charlie Swan.

A moment later, there's a resounding bang.


End file.
